For a Mother's Sins (14 page)

A muffled ‘No’ came from behind the curtain.

Rose shook her head. ‘I can’t get any sense out of that lad at the moment. You’d think he’d get off his bed and come out here to give me an answer.’

‘She never goes out, she’s always either here or home,’ said Molly, frantic now that she knew Lizzie wasn’t at the Pratts’. ‘It’s not fit for a dog to
be out on a night like this.’

Rose ushered her inside. ‘We’ll find her, lass. John, put your coat on and go knock on some doors. Try that blasted Welcome Inn, she might be there – I know she’s friends
with that good-for-nothing Florrie Parker.’

As he pulled on his jacket and boots, John tried to catch Molly’s eye without his mother noticing. He wanted to say something, offer some words of comfort, but knew he daren’t do
anything that would alert his mother to their friendship. In the end he gave up and hurried out into the wild wet night, hoping that Lizzie had simply lost track of time and was safe and sound in a
friend’s home.

‘Now then, pet, sit yourself down. Jim, make a drink of tea for her while I have a word with our Bob, see if she told him where she was going.’

‘She’s all I’ve got left. I know we’ve had our ups and downs, but I love my lass,’ said Molly, clutching her head in her hands, her long hair hanging damp over her
shoulders. Tears were welling in her eyes. Something must have happened to Lizzie, she could think of no other explanation.

Rose drew back the curtain that screened her son’s bed. Bob was lying with his face to the wall.

‘Did Lizzie tell you where she was going when she left here?’ she asked. When he failed to respond, she nudged the bed and demanded, ‘Look at me when I’m talking to you,
lad. Did Lizzie—’

‘No! For the second time! Now leave me alone,’ said Bob, still keeping his face turned away from her.

‘Are you sure?’ Rose insisted. ‘Her mother’s worried sick about her. Anything could have happened to the poor girl.’ Enraged by his refusal to turn and face her,
she grabbed hold of his shoulder and pulled with all her might.

‘I’ve bloody well not seen her! Leave me alone!’ cried Bob, shaking himself free and trying to pull the covers over him.

‘There’s no need to swear, not in my house!’ said Rose, then the significance of what she’d seen hit home. There were blood spots on her immaculate white pillow.
‘Bob! Is that blood? Did you hurt your head? What happened?’

‘I slipped on the mud and banged my head.’ He burrowed deeper under the covers. ‘Leave me alone, I’m trying to sleep.’

Rose withdrew, pulling the curtain closed behind her.

‘He knows nothing, Molly,’ she said apologetically. ‘Our Bob doesn’t say much at the best of times. I sometimes wonder what I’ve done to deserve him.’ She
pulled her chair next to Molly and laid a comforting hand on her arm.

‘Where can she be? Lizzie never goes anywhere. It’s my fault – I shouldn’t be working at that hospital. I should have more time for her. She’s been through just as
much as me.’ Molly’s eyes looked into Rose’s, pleading for sympathy.

‘Now then, pet, don’t talk that way. We’ll soon find her, she’ll not be far.’ But the anxious glance she cast at her husband betrayed her. She too was beginning to
fear the worst.

Jim put on his coat and went out to join the search. It was all Rose could do to dissuade Molly from going out too. Instead the two women sat and waited, Rose saying over and over that her lads
would bring Lizzie home safe, repeating it so often that she almost believed it. But when the men returned, the door slamming open from the gale that was now raging outside, they were alone.

‘No one’s seen her,’ said Jim. ‘She’s not with Florrie. We’ve tried all the huts and nobody’s seen her.’

John knelt beside Molly. ‘It’s not fit to look for her tonight – we’ll never find her in this weather and dark – but it’ll be light by five. I’m going
to get a search party organized and we’ll set out first thing.’ Then he went back out into the night, leaving Molly crying inconsolably.

By dawn the rain had eased and the wind was clearing any remaining clouds from the valley. John had found plenty of recruits willing to give up their Sunday lie-in to scour the
countryside for Lizzie. They might be rough, hard-drinking navvies, but when trouble befell their community they all stood together. To cover the ground more quickly they divided into three teams,
with John leading one, Jim another and Bob tagging along with the third.

‘I should go with them,’ said Molly, standing in the Pratts’ doorway as the teams set off in different directions.

Rose laid a restraining hand on her arm. ‘Your place is here, pet. When they find her, this is where they’ll bring her – and the first thing she’ll be wanting is her
mother.’ She pulled Molly inside. ‘Come on, lass, come and wait. That’s all we can do for now.’

John strode out upon the fell, scanning the horizon for a sign of movement, a skirt blowing in the wind, Lizzie’s wild dark hair trailing behind her as she ran. But the
only humans in this landscape were the men of the search party, spread out in a line extending from the viaduct and searching behind every rock and shrub. They had brought along a sturdy bog cart
with thick wide wheels, capable of carrying a load over the rough moorland. John hoped that it would not be needed, but he had decided it was as well to be prepared for the worst. If Lizzie had
come to harm, she would have to be transported home.

Slowly the men made their way up the valley towards Gearstones, their feet sinking into the boggy ground, the sphagnum moss that grew on the fell bottom squelching underfoot as they waded
through the peaty mire. Though it had stopped raining, the air felt damp and the mist hung around the high peaks with only a glint of sunshine trying to break through. It played on the raindrops
clinging to the cotton grass, making rainbow hues shine on the bowing grasses.

All of a sudden a shout went up. John’s heartbeat quickened as he saw one of the men run forward and pick something up. He lifted it above his head, and even from a distance John could
tell that it was one of Lizzie’s red ribbons, twisting in the wind. Galvanized by the confirmation that she was out here somewhere, the men redoubled their efforts. John only hoped they would
find her alive. While conditions were nowhere near as bad as they would have been in winter, last night’s storm had brought an unseasonal chill to the valley. She would need to have found
shelter if she was to stand a chance of lasting the night.

As they climbed the valley and the grassland started to give way to bracken, their progress slowed. The men had to sweep back and forth with their sticks to see through the dense growth. Ahead
of them was the great outcrop of limestone. John branched off from the search party and made his way through the bracken towards the base of the rockface. There, in the hollow at the bottom of the
outcrop, he spotted a hand and arm.

John shouted to the rest of the men and raced to her side. She was lying face down in the peat. He dropped to his knees beside her and took her hand in his. It was icy cold. But when he gave it
a tug, trying to turn her over, he heard a soft moan. He crouched and peered into her face and saw her eyelids flicker. She was alive, but only just.

‘Lizzie, Lizzie, it’s me,’ he said, stripping his jacket off and covering her with it. ‘You’re safe now, we’ll get you back to your ma.’

As he cradled her head tenderly in his lap, Lizzie groaned, muttered a few words and then passed out again. By this time the men had arrived, dragging the bog cart. Gently they lifted her frail
body on to it. The navvies looked on, anxious but relieved to have found her. They’d not wanted to take bad news home to her mother.

John walked by the side of the cart all the way back down the fell. He could see Lizzie’s leg was broken, and her arm. It looked as if she must have fallen from the top of the outcrop and
pulled herself under the rocks. He only hoped that she would survive her ordeal.

Molly ran out to meet the bog cart, her shawl and hair flowing in the wind, calling Lizzie’s name. Some of the men had hurried back with the news that Lizzie had been found alive and they
were bringing her home, and she’d set off up the track before they had finished speaking.

John watched as she grabbed the side of the wagon, tears running down her cheeks, anxious eyes on her daughter’s pale form. ‘We’ll take her to the hospital, Moll. The Doc will
soon fix her up – she’ll be all right, stop worrying.’ He wished he felt as optimistic as he sounded. If Lizzie died, it would hit Molly hard. The girl was all she had left.

‘Not the hospital! She doesn’t like the hospital, she thinks everyone dies there!’ Molly screamed as the wagon went past her home.

‘She’ll have to, Molly.’ John had to hold her back to prevent her trying to stop the cart. ‘She’s broken her leg and arm, Doctor Thistlethwaite will have
to—’

‘She’ll lose her leg! She can’t live like that!’ Molly screamed.

‘No, it’s a clean break, it’s not smashed – the doctor will save it. Same with her arm. But she’s in a bad way, Molly.’ He gripped her by the shoulders and
looked deep into her eyes. ‘If she’s to get better, she’s going to need you. You have to be strong for her sake, Molly, no hiding in the drink. I know you can do it. And this time
I’ll be here to help.’

Distraught, Molly pulled away from him and looked on as two of the navvies carried her daughter into the hospital hut. Then she ran after them, taking her place right beside Lizzie’s limp,
broken body as Doctor Thistlethwaite examined her.

John turned away from the hospital door, wet and exhausted. The fear in Molly’s eyes had chilled him to the bone. Head down, he dragged his boots homeward through the mud. When he got to
the hut, instead of going in, he slumped on the steps outside.

‘You’ve found her then? Thank the Lord for that,’ said Rose Pratt, coming to stand beside him.

‘Aye, well, I wouldn’t be thanking your God just yet. She’s as near heaven as I’ll ever get.’ John eased his mud-covered boots off and followed his mother inside.
‘Are Bob and Dad back yet?’

‘No, but someone’s gone to tell them that she’s been found, so they’ll be back soon.’ Rose put a mug of tea in front of him. ‘How is she? What was the poor
lass doing, climbing up there?’ She pulled up a chair and looked into her son’s troubled eyes. ‘What’s up, lad? Was she in a terrible mess?’

John nodded. ‘She kept drifting in and out, but she managed to whisper a few words to me . . .’ He shook his head and looked helplessly at his mother. ‘You’re not going
to like this.’

‘Go on, tell me, son. What did she say?’

‘I could barely make it out, her voice was so weak, but as I carried her to the cart she said, “It was Bob. Bob pushed me.”’

Rose let out a gasp and clasped a hand to her mouth.

‘She could only manage a whisper, but she said it all right. I couldn’t believe it, but then I got to thinking about the way he’s been sulking around lately . . .’ John
took a sip of his tea and looked at his mother.

‘No, not my lad.’ Rose was shaking her head adamantly. ‘He’d have nothing to do with her falling. He wouldn’t lay a finger on anyone, not my baby. She’s
making it up. She’s just like her mother, that one. I should never have taken her in! She’s been trouble since day one.’ Rose got up and began to poke the fire in the stove,
turning her face away from her son in an effort to hide her anguish. She knew, she’d always known, that something was not quite right with her youngest offspring. Ever since he was little
there had been days when it seemed he was wrestling with dark thoughts, but she’d clung to the hope it was just a phase, that the difficult years between boyhood and manhood would eventually
pass and he’d emerge on the other side as normal as his brothers and father.

Shaking her head violently, she turned to John with the kindling stick still alight in her hand. ‘You’re not to say a word of this to your father or to Bob. I’ll have a word
with him when we’re on our own. Don’t you breathe a word of this to anyone, you hear?’

John finished his tea in silence. He too had watched his brother wrestling with the black moods that came over him, but he had never thought that it would come to this.

‘I’ll talk to him,’ Rose insisted. ‘When you and your father get the trap ready to take us to chapel, I’ll have a word with him and get to the bottom of
this.’ She threw the stick into the fire. ‘Oh, I can’t stand thinking about this another minute. You lads will be the death of me!’ An image flashed into her mind: the blood
on the pillow, the cut on Bob’s head and the feeble explanation he had given her. She clutched at her chest, her voice shrill with panic: ‘If he’s done it, they’ll hang him.
Oh my Lord, he’ll end up at Lancaster Assizes! Oh, the shame of it, and after I’ve brought you all up to be good honest men. First our Mike and now this – what next, what have I
done to deserve this?’

‘Ma, calm down. I wish I’d never told you.’ John put an arm around his mother. ‘He mightn’t have done it, I might not have heard right.’

‘No, John. You and I both know that our Bob’s not that bright. Something happened yesterday – he’s got a cut on his head and bruises on his hands. If he’d been at
work, I’d think nothing of it, but he stopped at home all day yesterday.’ Rose was tugging on her damp handkerchief as if she would tear it into shreds. ‘There’s nothing
else for it: he’ll have to go your aunt Nancy’s in Durham. Yes, that’s the best thing, get him out of the way until everything calms down. With a bit of luck, the lass will not
live. That way no one’ll be any the wiser and he can come back home soon as the fuss has died down.’

John stared at her, horrified. ‘Ma, how can you say that? Hasn’t Molly been through enough without your wishing poor Lizzie dead?’

‘Better hers than one of mine. When you’ve had children, you’ll know how I feel. I’d die for you lads,’ Rose sobbed.

‘Ma, stop it. You need to calm down before Father gets home. There’s no sense in upsetting him with this until we know it’s right.’

John turned away from his mother, wishing he hadn’t told her what Lizzie had said. The events of this weekend had shown him a side to his family that he had never seen before. For the
first time in his life, he was ashamed to be a member of this household.